USA is the chief kingpin in the Afghanistan heroin trade

A Black Agenda Radio commentary, by Glen Ford, November 28, 2009

If you’re looking for the chief kingpin in the Afghanistan heroin trade, it’s the United States. The American mission has devolved to a Mafiosi-style arrangement that poisons every military and political alliance entered into by the U.S. and its puppet government in Kabul. It is a gangster occupation, in which U.S.-allied drug dealers are put in charge of the police and border patrol, while their rivals are placed on American hit lists, marked for death or capture. As a result, Afghanistan has been transformed into an opium plantation that supplies 90 percent of the world’s heroin...
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Martin Armstong – Forced to Move to a High Security Prison to Silence Him?

Just in from Nathan's Economic Edge:

Frankly, I cannot believe that I have to write the words that follow. I just learned that Martin Armstrong is being moved, possibly as early as Monday, from his current holding facility to a much higher security facility, MDC Brooklyn, which is similar to the facility he was in when he was in solitary confinement and where he was beaten nearly to death! This goes against the prison’s own rules and is against the law as he has two Habeas cases open in the Supreme Court.

Why would this be happening now with a little more than a year before he is eligible for parole? I and others contend that it is because of his recent writing activity and because of his recent interview with the New Yorker Magazine (- The New Yorker - "The Secret Cycle…"), and also because there are now several media outlets requesting to do interviews with him – the prison simply does not want, for whatever reason, the access that we have been enjoying lately to continue. I spoke directly to Martin’s younger sister, Nancy, and this is her opinion as well. She is very upset over this move as she, “fears that he may not make it out.” She claims that Martin is very much afraid of this move and for good reason…

First let’s review the facts… whatever you believe about his innocence or guilt or innocence of any crime, the facts are that he was never put on trial for any crime. He was held in contempt of court for not producing what the judge ordered him to produce, something which he claims he didn’t have. He was placed in MDC Manhattan and was basically TORTURED. According to Nancy, he was locked in solitary confinement for almost the entire duration, suffering days on end and at times was intentionally awaken every hour or so all night long, night after night, in an attempt to get him to sign a confession. He was repeatedly told that he would not get the chance to see his 91 year old mother alive again if he did not sign the confession. This took place off and on for SEVEN YEARS. Then one day a huge convict, “a known homicidal maniac” named George, was locked in his cell with him where he proceeded to beat and strangle him until he thought he was dead. Later, according to Armstrong, a fellow inmate stated that the guards watched the beating and refused to open the door to stop it. He lost most of his teeth, and now, over two years later is still missing them because the prison system only has one dentist for over 5,000 inmates. He suffered a detached retina, broken ribs and other internal injuries that left him in intensive care.

They offered him a plea agreement to TIME SERVED if he would plea guilty and after 7 years, he could take no more and agreed, obviously under heavy duress. However, after pleading guilty, the judge instead of living up to the plea agreement sentenced him to the maximum amount allowable and he is now not scheduled for release until September of 2011, first eligible for parole in March 2011. His current location is at Ft. Dix, New Jersey where he is only 20 minutes from his mother and sister, a relatively safe facility. His sister takes his infirmed mother to visit him once a week, but she will not be able to make the journey into Manhattan. He is now under great stress as he believes he may not survive while inside the new location.

Inside this facility, I am told, he will be basically strip searched with nearly every movement, and he is not granted some of the “privileges” that he currently has access to, thus producing his work will be impaired, if not eliminated all together.

The question is WHY would they break their own rules and the law to move him now? ... Read all here

Britain on the edge of financial armageddon (?)

He's one of our top entrepreneurs who recently put all his investments into cash. The reason: He believes Britain faces bankruptcy.
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More: 2010 horoscope for UK: capital flight, sovereign debt crisis

More: Where Dubai leads, Britain could soon follow

More: Morgan Stanley Fears UK Default in 2010

Interview: Ed Griffin on the Economic Crisis and the Monetary Elite

A good reading for this sunday from The Daily Bell, Sunday, November 29, 2009

The editors of the Daily Bell are pleased to publish an exclusive follow-up interview with legendary hard-money historian G. Edward Griffin who has much to say about the economic crisis, the mood of the monetary elite and the effect of the Internet on freedom.

Introduction: Mr. Griffin is a distinguished film producer, author and political lecturer. He is the founder of Freedom Force International, a libertarian-oriented activist network focused on advancing individual freedom. First released in 1994, Mr. Griffin's best-selling financial book, The Creature from Jekyll Island, is a no-holds-barred look into the inner workings of the Federal Reserve banking system, or cartel if you will. Mr. Griffin peels back the layers of obstruction to rational analysis and leads the reader on a wonderfully researched, although disturbing, journey from the very beginning, when the Fed was still in the planning stages, up to the present, where it is now struggling to survive. For many years, the editors of the Daily Bell have been avid readers of Mr. Griffin's tremendous literary contributions on free markets and personal liberty. His insights are especially noteworthy given the validity of his vision and the exciting and troublesome nature of the times in which we live.

Here is a brief synopsis of what Ed had to say:

Daily Bell: Has the stimulus helped? Why or why not?

Griffin: Has the stimulus helped? I guess the question is has the stimulus helped whom? Or What? The general idea is that the stimulus is supposed to stimulate the American economy and help the American people and in that I don't believe that there is any reason to think that it has helped at all. I don't think it was really designed to do that at all. It was designed to be sold that way but I don't think that anyone in Washington thought that it would actually accomplish the end objective. Now I suppose that some people did think so, I would have to backtrack on that, there are some collectivists that believe the government can solve all problems, that the government can take everything from the citizens and redistribute it back to them in a more efficient manner. There are people like that out there and they thought the stimulus package would help. Surely everybody understands that the money that is being spent is coming out of the pockets of the very people it is supposed to help.

Daily Bell: From the central banking mechanism?
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Climategate E-mails race across America

From the Telegraph:

Just a few considerations in addition to previous remarks about the explosion of the East Anglia Climategate e-mails in America. The reaction is growing exponentially there. Fox News, Barack Obama’s Nemesis, is now on the case, trampling all over Al Gore’s organic vegetable patch and breaking the White House windows. It has extracted some of the juiciest quotes from the e-mails and displayed them on-screen, with commentaries. Joe Public, coast-to-coast, now knows, thanks to the clowns at East Anglia’s CRU, just how royally he has been screwed.

Senator James Inhofe’s Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works has written to all the relevant US Government agencies, acquainting them with the nature of the e-mails. But the real car crash for Obama is on Capitol Hill where it is now confidently believed his Cap and Trade climate legislation is toast. It was always problematic; but with a growing awakening to the scale of the scientific imposture sweeping the world, as far as the Antipodes, the clever money is on Cap and Trade laws failing to pass, with many legislators sceptical and the mid-term elections looming ever closer.

At the more domestic level, the proposed ban on incandescent light bulbs, so supinely accepted in this servile state of Britain, is now provoking a huge backlash in America. US citizens do not like the government coming into their houses and putting their lights out. Voters may not understand the cut and thrust of climate debate at the technical level, but they know when the Man from Washington has crossed their threshold uninvited.

The term that Fox News is now applying to the Climategate e-mails is “game-changer”. For the first time, Anthropogenic Global Warming cranks are on the defensive, losing their cool and uttering desperate mantras such as “You can be sceptical, not denial.” Gee, thanks, guys. In fact we shall be whatever we want to be, without asking your permission.

At this rate, Copenhagen is going to turn into a comedy convention with the real world laughing at these liars. Now is the time to mount massive resistance to the petty tyrants and hit them where it hurts – in the wallet. Further down the line there may be, in many countries, a question of criminal prosecution of anybody who has falsified data to secure funds and impose potentially disastrous fiscal restraints on the world in deference to a massive hoax. It’s a new world out there, Al, and, as you may have noticed, the climate is very cold indeed.
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